Viscoelastic surfactant (VES) based fluids have been widely used as gravel-packing, frac-packing and fracturing fluids for more than a decade because the fluids exhibit excellent rheological properties and maintain low formation damage characteristics. However, unlike crosslinked polymer fluids, VES fluids do not form filter-cake on formation face during fracturing and frac-pack treatments, thus VES fluids can exhibit very high fluid leak-off from the fracture during a treatment and the fluid efficiency can be much lower than that of the crosslinked polymer fluids.
Various fluid loss control agents have been disclosed in the art. Despite all the advances, there remains a need in the art for additional materials having improved fluid loss control efficiencies. It would be a further advantage if the improved fluid efficiency could be achieved without a significant detrimental effect on other desirable properties of the VES fluids.